Railways Bill

David Chadwick Excerpts

Tuesday 9th December 2025 Commons Chamber

[David Chadwick (Brecon, Radnor and Cwm Tawe) (LD)]

Let me be clear from the outset that the Bill fails Wales. Last year, Wales voted decisively for change, and this is just another example of how that change will not be coming. The Bill fails my constituents, who rely on some of the most neglected rail lines anywhere in the United Kingdom.

For years, the people I represent have endured cancellations, painfully slow journeys, ageing trains and stations that would embarrass any modern transport system. The Marches line still runs on signalling technology that belongs in a museum. The Heart of Wales line—a lifeline for rural communities—has been crying out for meaningful investment for over a decade. What does the Bill do to fix any of that? Nothing. Instead, it centralises even more power here in Whitehall and offers Wales nothing more than a pat on the head and the promise of consultation. Consultation is what Wales has had plenty of for the last 30 years and look where it has got us.

Yet the real injustice is this: Scotland gets real power over its railways and Wales gets nothing. No power of direction, no power over infrastructure, no power over funding and not even a guarantee that Welsh needs will be taken seriously. This Government have gone out of their way to give Scotland the meaningful authority and yet Wales, a nation with its own Parliament and its own transport strategy, is told to make do with a memorandum of understanding—a document with no legal force, no accountability and no guarantee of action.

That inequality has real-world consequences. Independent experts told the Transport Committee that England will receive tens of billions in rail investment over the next decade, while Wales will receive only a few hundred million. That is a gap so vast that it can only be described as systemic neglect. Indeed, just this week, analysis by the Welsh Liberal Democrats showed that Wales is set to lose another £1 billion after Northern Powerhouse Rail was wrongly classified as an England and Wales project. That brings the total lost for Wales through that accounting trick to around £6 billion, while Scotland and Northern Ireland receive their fair share. Meanwhile, the Government expect Wales to be grateful for £445 million over 10 years. It does not take a maths genius to see that those of us in Wales are being short changed.

My constituents see the results every day: rural stations left behind, limited services, long commutes and opportunities missed. The rail network in Wales is not second-class by accident but is second-class by design, and the Bill entrenches that design. It hands the UK Secretary of State even more control over decisions that directly affect Wales, with no matching powers for Welsh Ministers to shape the services that our communities rely on.

Let me say this plainly. A modern railway for Wales cannot be built on scraps of power handed down from Westminster. Wales needs the same powers that Scotland already has, Wales needs fairness, not favours, and Wales needs the tools to build a railway network worthy of our own people. Wales deserves better than this Bill and as Welsh Liberal Democrats, we will not accept anything less than equality for our nation.